Online businesses are always looking for ways to improve their sales funnel. This means they must have the right product advertised to the right audience. But how do they find them? Have you ever wondered how digital marketing companies target audiences streaming online?
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Marketing personalized ads
Thankfully, in 2023 it is rare to bump into advertisements that are off-putting to us. This is because big names in the advertising and marketing industry like Google have implemented policies intended to weed out random and inappropriate content from its trusted advertisers and publishers. And while none of us want to see an overabundance of ads, what’s worse is seeing ads that have virtually no relevance to your search or interests. This is where personalized ads come in.
According to Google, personalized advertising and marketing “is a powerful tool that improves advertising relevance for users and increases ROI for advertisers.”
Google considers ads personalized when “they are based on previously collected or historical data to determine or influence ad selection, including a user’s previous search queries, activity, visits to sites or apps, demographic information, or location.”
In other words, your ad experience is based on data. Specifically, your data. Information is collected based on your search queries, browsing history, physical location, and any known information you may have provided.
Some of this you can’t control. Location, for example, whether you’ve ever used the browser or not, provides a lot of insight for advertisers in selecting the best ads for you. For example, if you’re living in a town with a local government race, it would make sense to show ads for candidates in that race. At least, it makes more sense than showing more gold and silver coin sale pop-ups.
How personalized ads are chosen based on your location
Online marketers display relevant ads by accessing your IP address. Every device that accesses the web has an IP address. An IP address contains the network ID and host ID. And while your IP address actually reflects your router (not your actual device), it includes a lot of information about your device, location, region, and internet service provider. Yes, it is mostly location information, but that comes packed with demographic info as well.
How do marketing companies use IPs to target audiences?
There are different ways in which IP addresses work to give businesses insight into selecting personalized ads. Mainly, there are two ways of IP targeting; Targeting By Network, Targeting By Geolocation.
Targeting by network marketing
Data can be collected based on company-specific information. It includes the company name, domain name, and internet service provider.
It also includes static and dynamic IPs.
With static IPs, users have unchanged IP addresses. This makes it easy for websites to display ads relevant to the IP address holder, like location-based and industry-relevant ads.
Dynamic IPs are addresses that an internet service provider allows temporary use of. Although the name means “temporary,” dynamic is the most common type of IP address for casual users. This is because dynamic IPs are used when you access the internet through a cable or mobile internet provider.
In other words, you’re accessing the internet without having to set up your own servers and hosts, so you’re connecting your devices to someone else’s, and they assign a temporary (or dynamic) IP.
Targeting by geolocation marketing
Businesses target geolocation IP addresses with the help of users’ WiFi or GPS. It helps companies target their customers for specific locations to display personalized ads. That’s how personalized ads are chosen based on your IP address.
Final words
Online marketers have a lot of great (and scary) ways to identify the most personalized ad experience for us. And while browsing history, search queries and location make a lot of sense in terms of internet viewing advertising and marketing experiences, it will be interesting to see how this takes shape in the streaming industry now that Netflix has embraced ad-supported membership tiers.
It’s noticeable (but tolerable) when Hulu and Peacock throw an ad up every 15 minutes, but with Netflix making up nearly 8% of television viewing in 2022 against all competitors and mediums (including live streaming and cable), one wonders how personalized ads will be selected with a user’s location and video viewing history alone. Yes, similar video content makes sense, but since when did all advertisements on TV become a trailer for the newest film?
Will our television ads become even more personal as the delivery mechanism matures on Netflix? Are we that much closer to Tom Cruise’s mall walk in the Minority Report?
Stay tuned.
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